Re: (Jack Orr)

Just arrived at the hotel. First to arrive apparently as I see no other Phaetons yet. The nav system worked flawlessly with no mistakes the entire 760 mile trip. Rain was bad in Ohio but otherwise I sneaked through most all bad traffic problems. I'm sure pictures of us will get posted soon. BTW, my W12 got 21.1 mpg on average using regular unleaded!! Not bad IMO.
David

Re: (vwguild)

Hi All:
For those of you who could not make to Detroit, here are a few photos of Saturday's activities. The event is still going on, more photos to follow tomorrow.
MichaelThe whole gang - official portrait at the Hampton InnParking without worrying about door dingsOops, wrong manufacturer - there are so many car companies in Detroit...Discussions, News, and Information from our Hosts
Far left: Mr. David Wicks. Far right: Mr. Len HuntReception and Munchies in the VW MuseumIt was unanimously agreed not to put a Canadian in charge of the weather at next year's Phaeton get-together

Re: (PanEuropean)

Just a quick reminder to everyone who was at the afternoon meeting (pictured above) - I think you all know that some things were disclosed to us 'in private' about upcoming product improvements. Even though all of this was great news, I think it is important that we remember that our hosts spoke to us 'in private', and not in the same guarded manner that they would if the press had been there. So, in appreciation and respect for their openness and candor with us, it would be most courteous if we did not disclose certain things we were told here on the forum, or discuss them until VW makes the official public announcements about year to year product changes and improvements.
For those of you who weren't there, we're not talking about announcement of an upcoming Phaeton convertible, station wagon, roadster, or Popemobile - just ongoing product changes that normally happen from year to year in every car.
Michael

Re: (Paldi)

Well - I know that the people who were there read this BB, so this is the easiest way to reach everyone. And, I know that the people who were not there are courteous enough that they won't ask, even if they are curious.
Trust me, there was nothing earth-shattering revealed - it's just that all the VW people were very open and honest with us, and there were lots of key VW people there - we want to retain their trust and confidence, so we will enjoy the same level of access and open discussion at next year's Phaeton owner get-together.
Michael

Re: (PanEuropean)

Just for the record, let's just let it be said that the pride and enthusiasm for the PHAETON is a two way street...additionally, this was probably the first meeting of it's kind in US automobile history...No company sponsored "focus
group" with an agenda...But an open, social, fun, cordial, and very positive exchange...
You can all be proud of your decision, and secure in the knowledge that the same pride is felt in Auburn Hills...

Re: (vwguild)

Just for the record, let's just let it be said that the pride and enthusiasm for the PHAETON is a two way street...additionally, this was probably the first meeting of it's kind in US automobile history...No company sponsored "focus
group" with an agenda...But an open, social, fun, cordial, and very positive exchange...
You can all be proud of your decision, and secure in the knowledge that the same pride is felt in Auburn Hills...

Here here Peter! In 16 years of Automotive Sales & Marketing I've never heard of or been a part of a gather like the one I attended yesterday afternoon. A very positive exchange.
Mr. Hunt said that Phaeton owners reflect the true spirit of VW...that as a group you are different, original and unique. I think the same can be said of this weekends events.

Re: (PhaetonChix)

Man, did you "guys" pick a weekend, or what? My apologies!
To those of you who traveled via Phaeton from the South: you cannot say your car has never seen snow now!
It looked like a great time. I drove by VW's building a wink before noon to show my support but no one had arrived.
Drive safely today.

Re: (PanEuropean)

Hi Michael, looks like it was a great event and I am truly sorry I was unable to make it. While I certainly respect the need for privacy I really doubt they would have said anything that would be compromising. In venues such as this, anything said must be assumed to be in the public arena. Meanwhile does the public mean Phaeton owners who would have attended, but couldn't for matters beyond their control? Is it safe to assume that yesterday's message was expected to be passed along to the enthusiast owners who couldn't attend? Meanwhile besides model year tweaks, what did they have to say about the long discussed matters here which are closest to our hearts? Lack of marketing, VW's vision going forward, dealer experience and upgrading, sales efforts, etc etc.... these would have been some of my questions had I been able to attend.
Thanks
Ed.

Re: (PanEuropean)

Michael, to this day I can never open your pictures. All I see is a line of bold print- the caption. I don't have this trouble with the pictures that anyone else posts- just yours. I have all the appropriate tools in my computer.
I really would like to see the Auburn Hills pics. How can I do it?

One major wreck in Detroit detoured us about 45 minutes but the weather got worse below Detroit until we got to Dayton, Ohio and then the sun popped out, no more snow, and fair weather from that point on. Louisville is where we decided to stop for the night. Seems the lowering of the car 10 mm has been a great success as the ride seems fine. I apologize for leaving as soon as I did but I could tell my father and son were anxious to head home. I wanted to stay till at least 4:00. I never knew how easy the battery drains which leads to so many fault codes to pop up. We had to scan the cars before doing mods due to fault codes in many of the cars. Annoying problem but very easily fixed and was fun to do. I strongly recommend anyone with computer know-how to get a VAG .
The GTG was definitely a success and I hope to return next year for a follow up meeting. Thanks to Michael and Phaetonchix for their hard work in keeping the schedule together during the bad weather. [IMG]http://**********************/smile/emthup.gif[/IMG]
Also , many more thanks to Michael for his hard work in improving the VAG programming in connection with Ross-Tech. For idiots like me, it is now bulletproof to make safe mods to the car.

Re: (PhaetonChix)

Well, everybody's driving home in their newly lowered Phaetons, and i'm sitting in the hotel room (flight in the morning). The weather wasn't great, but it was really a non-issue (maybe those driving home in it feel differently). This was a great weekend, better than I expected in a lot of ways. The time at VW was pretty extraordinary - I guarantee you that the heads of MBUSA or BMWNA and their entire senior staffs don't take time to meet with small, informal groups of S-Class or 7 Series owners on their weekend time. I came away with a lot more confidence in VW's strategy with the car, and with its long term viability. The informal time with folks from the forum was a pleasure, whether dining, drinking or hanging out in the hotel lobby, getting to meet some of our most prolific posters as well as some others like me who post occasionally but read constantly. Without exception, a thoroughly decent and enjoyable group of people. The tech session today (which I left early to hit the Henry Ford Museum and Ford Facotry Tour) was also a winner; it's time to upgrade my old vag-com and get to work on lowering to Euro-spec and killing the DRLs.
Many thanks to Michael and to PhaetonChix for setting up an event that was a perfect mix of informal downtime with a lot of substance, and despite their protestations it was obvious that a lot of work went into it, both with the people at VW HQ and with the tech session. Thanks to PhaetonChix's friend David as well, for taking his Sunday - and the shop he works at - and making them available to us when he hadn't had a break in a couple of weeks and would probably rather be chilling out in front of the TV on a snowy weekend day. He's a great guy and a true car nut, and I look forward to talking with him about taking my P-car jones to the next level..
It sounds like this is going to become an annual event, at least. If you didn't make it this time, make it next time, you won't regret it.

Re: (Paldi)

The photos of the Phaeton with silver valances do not do the car justice. Subtle and very tastefully modification. Absolutely OUTSTANDING. Michael should be posting more photos in the next few days that will highlight the difference.
Not one of the cars that showed up this weekend were the same...and 3 W12's to boot. The majority of the Phaeton dealers in the US have not had this many W12's on their lots.

Re: (PC Dave)

Hi Everyone:
Wow - I made it home. The snow got worse as I drove north towards Port Huron - there were cars in the ditch all over the place (no VW products, of course).
What can I say? It was a wonderful, wonderful weekend. Thanks so much to all of you who came, most especially to Rick, Dave, Peter, and John, who flew in. Super-special thanks to Andrew Cowan for his awesome patience and tolerance of all the adults (including his parent) who spent the whole weekend continually playing with their toys, staying up past bedtime, and stuff like that.
I am really overwhelmed by how well VW treated us - never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined that so many folks at VW - from every possible department - giving up their Saturday afternoon to come and meet with a dozen of the 250,000+ people who bought Volkswagens in North America last year. What an amazing company, I am really proud to own their flagship product. All of us - VW owners and VW staff alike - agree that we will do it again next year, hopefully on a larger scale. I think there will be a little write-up in the 'Driver' magazine, that will probably help us attract more Phaeton owners - maybe even some folks that don't live on the internet, like us - to next year's event.
The 'tech day' at Monk's was really, really educational. I learned a great deal - it sure was interesting to do full diagnostic scans on 7 different Phaetons, and note that all 8 reported the same minor fault code (00220 - Connection to Sunroof 004 - No Signal/Communication - Intermittent), even though everyone's sunroof worked perfectly and no-one has ever had a complaint about it. I think we now know that particular sunroof fault code is, in fact, a coded, secret message that means "Hey, you let your vehicle power supply battery run low again, hook up the battery tender next time you have it in the shop!" If you want to compare the diagnostic scans of all the different Phaetons that were there, you can find them at this link: Archive of Phaeton Diagnostic Scans. It makes fascinating reading.
It was also fun to do all the suspension adjustments. All the Phaetons are now properly coded and adapted as they were intended to be, with the European ride height properly done (meaning, via coding and truthful adaptation values, not by fibbing during the adaptation process like the Touareg folks have done in the past). I think I could probably survive in a flat rate shop now - the last two cars only took 15 minutes each, and that was with two full adaptation cycles per car, to double-check that all was correct. What a ton of fun. Next year, we'll have to bring a VAS 5052 to the get-together, and we can do software updates on all the controllers, instead of suspension recoding and adaptations.
Again, thanks to everyone who participated, you were great. Thanks also to Eve and David, and to the management of Munk's, for making such a great learning experience possible for all of us.
MichaelLesson 1, Product Identification: Which VW in the photo below does not match the others?We are sure they have moving parts under the hood somewhere - it's just that we can't see anything move...Lesson 2: How to enable "Jacking Up Mode"Because the Phaeton Owner Manual devotes a whole page (book 3.2, page 69) to explaining how to enable this function,
this must mean that VW expects Phaeton owners to be proficient at doing this, right?Lesson 3: If you lower the car 10 mm to the original design height, this will affect your wheel alignment......so, you have to learn all about camber, caster, and toe-in......and have the correct tool available to check your work when you are finished the adjustment.Many thanks to David for bringing a high-quality measuring tool to use when we did the suspension adaptationsDid I mention it snowed again?